


Hand in Hand

by MostGeckcellent



Category: Les Misérables (2012), Les Misérables - All Media Types, Les Misérables - Victor Hugo
Genre: Fae & Fairies, Kidnapping, Magic, Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-04
Updated: 2021-02-04
Packaged: 2021-03-16 01:08:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,403
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29198862
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MostGeckcellent/pseuds/MostGeckcellent
Summary: Jehan is a poet, selling mushrooms and herbs they find in the woods to help make ends meet. They meet someone strange in the woods. Will they make it out without losing themself?
Relationships: Montparnasse/Jean Prouvaire
Comments: 2
Kudos: 6





	Hand in Hand

Jehan is hungry. The aesthetic of the starving artist, it turns out, is not one they are as suited to as they had thought. They do not regret, of course, leaving their family, who could never understand them, or approve of them, but it is a harder life, in many ways, even as it is a better one. Still - they are hungry, and pretty words do not buy bread. 

They go into the woods. It has been raining - they may have some luck at finding mushrooms, and the local hedge witch has bought herbs from them before. They whisper a poem to the mushrooms as they fill their basket, and to the leaves they pluck from their stems, and they return to town, unaware of the eyes following them. 

Jehan trades wild onions for bread and butter, and a bowl of stew, from the innkeeper Musichetta. They perform a few poems for the travellers passing by, and earn a bed for the night, too. Musichetta is kind. 

The days run together. Jehan earns a job at the inn; they have a talent for finding the right things in the forest, and Musichetta says she likes their poems. It is not the life they dreamed of, but it is a pleasant enough life for now. 

There has been someone following Jehan in the woods. There has been someone for some time now; it took Jehan a long time to notice, but not as long as their watcher believes. They wait, and pretend not to see; they do not want to frighten their new friend away. 

Eventually, Jehan sees their forest companion properly. “Hello,” they say simply. “I have been wondering when you will speak to me.” 

“Hello,” the creature says. He looks like a man, but not quite; he looks like an approximation of a man, and it is near impossible to tell just what is not right. 

“Do you like to listen to my poems?” Jehan asks. “I can tell you another.” 

“Tell me another,” the almost-man demands. 

Jehan smiles and obliges. 

It is not the last Jehan sees of him. He is there almost every day, now, in the corner of Jehan’s vision. They have always been blessed with the True Sight, but now they know that they are meant to see him there, and so they wave, and smile, and carry on with their work. They speak poetry to the mushrooms, and to the little bluebird which steals seeds from their basket, and now they speak poetry to the strange man in the woods. 

“There’s a Trickster been at it again,” the townsfolk grumble, drinking away their troubles at the inn. “Had a sheep go missing last week, and now the grain’s gone off. T’ain’t right.” 

“Leave milk and honey on the step,” one advises. 

“Spill grain on the floor, and it’ll have to count until the sun rises,” suggests another. 

“I think he prefers poetry,” Jehan muses to themself, but says nothing of the sort to the men. They wouldn’t understand. 

Jehan goes into the woods at night. They shouldn’t, it isn’t safe, not with a Trickster about, but they aren’t frightened. They lay on the grass, and watch the stars, and scribble words on parchment. 

“You should be safe in bed, little lamb,” a voice says. It is sweet, melodic. 

“Am I not safe here?” Jehan asks lightly. 

“No,” Jehan’s Trickster says. 

“Are you here to abduct me to your fey realm?” they ask him. 

“...No,” he replies after a moment’s pause. 

“Would you like to hear the poem I am writing? It is about the stars,” Jehan says. 

“Yes.” 

Jehan says the beginnings of their poem. They make some changes as they go - it is still a work in progress, after all - but the Trickster makes no complaint. 

“You should go back to your bed,” he says when Jehan is finished. “Strange things are afoot.” 

“Many would say I am a strange thing myself,” Jehan counters. 

“Perhaps,” the Trickster allows. He is smiling. 

“I think I will take your advice,” Jehan decides, and they stand. “What trouble have you made tonight?”

“Sleep well, little lamb,” the Trickster says without answering, and vanishes. 

In the morning, the banker complains that the gold has turned to straw. Jehan finds a gold coin on their dresser, and smiles. The letter M is carved into the wood beside it. Jehan pockets the coin, and carves a little J next to it. Surely Musichetta will understand.

Jehan collects water from the river under the full moon. They find a few flat stones, and pocket those, too. It is a beautiful night - cloudless and still. The fireflies dance all around them. The nyads sing, and the dryads reply. It is not a song that most could hear, but Jehan knows and loves it well. Their True Sight extends to their hearing, too, they suppose. 

“It is a full moon, little lamb.” Jehan’s Trickster arrives, and sits beside them at the riverbank. 

“So it is,” Jehan agrees. The pair sit close enough for their fingers to intertwine. “Dance with me, and I will tell you another poem,” they bargain. 

The Trickster stands, and offers Jehan a hand up. “You hear the song?” he asks. 

“I see and hear many things,” Jehan answers. 

“You have the Sight.” 

Their dance is slow, and then it is fast; it is no dance that Jehan knows, but they keep up perfectly nonetheless. “I do.” 

“You shouldn’t broadcast the fact.” 

“I don’t. If you were going to harm me, you’d have done so long ago,” Jehan asserts. 

The Trickster doesn’t respond. Their dance ends, and he is gone. Jehan sighs softly, gathers up their moonwater, and heads back toward town. 

The Trickster does not appear every night, but Jehan returns to the woods just in case. It has been some days since the Trickster last came, and Jehan nearly thinks he will not return, but he is there again. 

“You must go,” he says, and he attempts to sound unconcerned, but fails. 

“Am I in danger?” Jehan asks. 

“You are always in danger.” 

“More than usual, then?” 

“Yes,” the Trickster admits. 

“Will you not protect me?” Jehan asks. 

“I cannot.” 

“Are you in danger?” 

“I answer to someone more dangerous than I,” the Trickster says.

Jehan considers this. They are unafraid for themself, but do not want to put their slippery friend at risk. “If I go now, will I see you again?” they ask. 

“Hopefully not,” the Trickster answers. 

“Then I cannot go,” Jehan says. “After all, I promised you a poem for your dance, and I have not yet delivered.” 

“Say your poem quickly then,” the Trickster says, “And go.” 

“A poem is not meant to be rushed.” 

The Trickster growls in frustration, but Jehan is not to be put off. They recite just as they please, and the Trickster stays, despite his protests. 

“You see?” Jehan says when they finish. “Nothing horrible has happened.” 

The Trickster reaches out, and brushes a thumb along Jehan’s cheek. Jehan leans in, and steals a kiss. 

“You are a dangerous little lamb,” the Trickster whispers. 

“A wolf in sheep’s clothing,” Jehan whispers back. 

“Even a wolf may be hunted. Take care, sweet thing,” the Trickster says. 

“I will,” Jehan promises. There is iron on their windowsill; they will wear it into the woods tomorrow. 

The Trickster goes, and Jehan begins their journey home. They do not make it there. Their True Sight tells them something is coming, but not fast enough. They fall asleep on the forest floor, and the last thing they see is the fey creature bearing down on them. 

  
  


They wake, and they know they are no longer in their own world. It is a difficult adjustment, their True Sight inducing a dizzying double vision here in the Otherworld - for that is what this must be. Jehan sits up slowly, and takes in the scene. Their Trickster is here, leaning seemingly casually against a tree as wide as three men. The fey creature who stole Jehan is there too; they see him twice, layered one over the other. A willowy figure, seven feet tall, gaunt and pale and threatening, overlaid by what Jehan supposes is a glamour of some sort. They wonder if this is what the faerie thinks Jehan will find appealing; the glamour is of a gaudy man, dressed in rich fabrics and with shockingly red curls, and a moustache which the faerie twirls between his fingers. He wears a top hat and pointed shoes, and Jehan is the last to judge another for what he wears, but the end result, they have to admit, is distasteful. 

“Well, well, well, it seems your little lamb is waking, Monty,” the faerie says to the Trickster. 

“Don’t call me Monty.” The Trickster says little, gives nothing away. 

“Excuse me,” Jehan interrupts. “But it is awfully rude to simply ignore a guest, is it not?” 

They likely should avoid the attention of this fae creature, but self-preservation has never been one of Jehan’s strongest suits. 

“Why, it is,” the faerie-man says with what Jehan is sure is meant to be a charming smile. “Tell me, what is your name, little lamb?”

“I have been called many things,” Jehan replies. “I would ask you call me something else; that epithet has been given to me by another, and I hold it dear.” 

“Give me something else to name you then,” the faerie challenges. 

“Give it up, one little mortal cannot be worth it,” the Trickster says, pushing off the tree. “Don't see why you care so much, Jondrette.” 

Jondrette scowls. “This one’s clearly worth something to you, Monty,” he retaliates. “I only want to know what little treasure you’ve been hiding from me.” 

“A poet, to pass the time, and nothing more.” 

“Poetry? Bah! You’ve always been soft, but you expect me to believe you’re after a mortal’s poetry?”

Jehan watches the two face off, trying to measure their options. Their Trickster is somehow indebted to this Jondrette, and cannot cross him too directly. Jehan will likely not find a way out of the Otherworld on their own, and as much as this place fascinates them, they are not entirely ready to die here. So, they must find a way to free the Trickster and themself, in one move, without Jondrette the wiser. A difficult proposition, when they do not know what binds the Trickster to this faerie-man, this Jondrette.

“My poetry is nothing to scoff at,” Jehan speaks up. “A bargain, sir.”

“A bargain?” Jondrette looks intrigued, at least. 

“Let me recite to you,” they say. “If you are unmoved, I shall remain, and find some other way to entertain you. But if my poetry does stir you, you shall let me go, and this Trickster you call Monty too, to come and go from the Otherworld as we please, answering to none, from that moment on.” This faerie may be dangerous, but no faerie can lie; if the bargain is struck, they will all be held to it. 

“Not much of a bargain,” Jondrette observes. “I could refuse, and make you entertain me regardless, little lamb.” 

“But what do you stand to lose? If you are indeed as untouched by verse as you say, sir,” Jehan reasons. “And then none would have reason to doubt you - none could say you were afraid to make a wager with a silly mortal poet.” 

Jehan’s manipulation is unsubtle, but luckily Jondrette does not appear to be a particularly bright man. Jondrette glowers at Jehan. 

“Oh, very well,” he agrees, magnanimous. “Amaze me, little poet.” 

Jehan takes a deep breath, and exchanges a look with the Trickster. He looks as he ever does, unconcerned and a touch bored, but Jehan can read him better than that. Monty, as he is apparently called, is frightened. Not for himself - well, a little for himself - but for Jehan. It’s very sweet. They smile at him, and he straightens up, scowling even harder. Jehan wracks their brain for the right poem - this would be easier if they knew anything about Jondrette. Tugging on a stranger’s heartstrings is harder than a friend’s. 

They glance at the Trickster again. He shows no sign of anxiety except for the finger tapping rapidly on his thigh. Jehan has to get this right - for him, as well as themself. They take a deep breath, and begin. 

In the end, it comes naturally. Jehan has spoken poetry to nearly every living thing they have met, strangers and friends alike. They wear verse like a second skin, living in the world of words and phrases and rhymes. They do not know Jondrette, but they know how to weave a tale, and how to read an audience, and slowly, they spin their story. 

Jehan doesn’t know how long it lasts. Minutes, hours, days; time passes strangely here. They speak until the words run out, and words have never failed Jehan before. The Trickster is entranced; Jondrette is, in the end, an easy man to manipulate. He wears his emotions on his sleeve, and Jehan plays him like a lute. 

The sun does not move in the sky, not in this strange place, but when the poem ends, Jehan is dry in the mouth and throat, and hungry. They are so, so hungry. 

“Are you moved, sir?” Jehan asks. “I could swear I saw you smile, and weep, and frown.” 

A faerie cannot lie. 

Jondrette snarls, raises a hand as if to strike Jehan. The blow never comes. The Trickster is between them, one fist wrapped around Jondrette’s arm. 

“You made a bargain,” he says, quiet. “You are a man of your word.” 

“Bah!” Jondrette spits at the Trickster’s feet. “Be gone, then, and good riddance, ingrate.” 

Montparnasse release’s Jondrette’s arm, and takes Jehan’s hand instead. 

They leave the Otherworld together, hand in hand. They pass between realms, and Jehan shivers. They turn to their Trickster. “Will you stay, now?”

“Your mortal friends will not tolerate me.” 

“They will, if they are my friends.” 

The Trickster hesitates. “I am Montparnasse,” he says. 

“And I am Jehan,” Jehan says. They squeeze Montparnasse’s hand. “If you will not come to the village, let us make a home here,” they suggest. “A cottage in the woods.”

“As you wish, my Jehan.” Montparnasse says Jehan’s name like it is a precious gift. It is. 

Jehan kisses him. “My Montparnasse.” 


End file.
